


One is the Loneliest Number

by NeverEndingStoryteller



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-15
Updated: 2019-08-15
Packaged: 2020-09-01 11:29:51
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,589
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20257384
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NeverEndingStoryteller/pseuds/NeverEndingStoryteller
Summary: Prime (001), the first of Hawkins Labs experiments has been trapped in the void (Upside down) for who knows how long. Until one day, in the endless rows of days, something unexpected happens. A boy, named Will Byers appears. Prime decides to help Will Byers and hopes that maybe this will be his chance to escape. Not that he really thinks they’ll make it out, but it's nice to think about.





	1. Chapter 1: The Void

**Author's Note:**

> So I had a thought of, "we all know Eleven and we've met Kali her sister who was 008, what about the others?" So this is me on a binge since I'm not over Season 3 yet and need to kill a year before the next fix.

001

Prime has lost track of the days he’s been here. He used to try to keep count. But it’s futile when there’s no sun in the sky to mark the days. Just endless darkness. 

He had been terrified when he’d first arrived. Scared shitless really and he still is at times, he’s just gotten better at controlling it. Better at surviving the void. And he has survived for lack of a better term. At least he thinks so, sometimes its hard to tell. The air in the void makes it difficult to think let alone focus and he’s pretty sure that its caused a few mutations. Like his teeth. They didn’t use to be so sharp or so long. At least he doesn’t think so. Again its hard to remember.

Prime tried escaping before, in the beginning, he’d run himself ragged looking for a way out. He never found it. Now he spends his days looking for food. Not that what he eats can really be called that. He’s had to make due with what he finds and its nothing he would have considered eating before. Mostly mushrooms and slugs.Everything tastes disgusting, but it keeps him alive, at least he thinks so. He checks for his heartbeat on occasion when he’s not sure, but it’s still there so that must mean he’s alive, even if he doesn’t really feel it. 

Since the whole teeth change he’s been able to fight more with the creatures in the woods. Initially the smaller ones on four legs. He eats what little meat they have on them. Everything in the void is starving and it's a constant battle in the food chain. 

He makes a routine, because routines are good. That’s what the doctors at the lab used to say. Though they’re the ones that put him here so who knows if what they said was true. But he continues with his routine it helps even if he can’t count the days. 

Wake up

Wander

Kill

Eat

Sleep

Fairly simple. Makes it easy to remember. Until things start to change. It starts with the sky. It starts to light up. Still dark but with orange mixed in. It lights up and looks charged as if the void is preparing for something. 

Then a new monsters shows up, this one is bigger and stands on two legs. The new creature when Prime first sees it terrifies him. He does his best to suppress it, fear after all attracts the monsters and while he may constantly be afraid in the void, its terror that makes you stand out like a beacon in this hellish place.

So he tries not to panic when the new monster arrives or when the sky changes or when the trees begin to move in excitement. 

It all comes to a head though soon after when he finds a crying boy in a wooden house. A boy that was not here before who came from outside and just maybe could be the way for Prime to escape the void.


	2. Chapter 2

The boy was very small with big fearful eyes and a timid demeanor, though that could be due to where he’s found himself.

He did not react well to Prime’s presence when they first met. Which was understandable given that Primes appearance had not been a priority during his time here. 

His once shaved head now sprouted long and tangled hair that ran to his mid back. His skin was covered in all manner of grime and dirt. There was also dried blood from the creatures he ate around his mouth and on his hands. The hospital gown that he had originally worn when he arrived had long since been lost and so he walked naked.

The boy had screamed in fear when Prime came across him and had tried to run away, only to trip over a root and fall face first into the ground. He’d cried as Prime approached to kneel in front of him. He had manically begged for his life through a face full of tears and snot. Only to stop abruptly when Prime spoke to him, “Shhh it's alrights, I’m not going to hurt you”. 

Prime studied the boy in front of him. He was soaking wet, looked like he hadn’t slept in a while and judging from the smell urinated on himself recently. Probably when Prime had startled him. 

They sat in silence until the boy had calmed enough and had begun studying Prime in turn.

Prime open and closed his mouth wanting to ask if the boy was alright and then realizing where they were, decided that it was a stupid and rather pointless question. He also hadn’t had a conversation with anyone in days ..months... years? So he simply waited and let the boy start when he was ready.

“Who are you?” , the boy finally asked voice shaky and fearful.

“I am One” , Prime responded, but cringed at the words he’d spoken. He hated his number. It's why he had started referring to himself as Prime after discovering it was a synonym for the number 1. He thought it was quite clever. No one had ever called him that out loud though. He had intended to tell some of the other patients in the lab, but he had never gotten the chance. So he had been the only one to refer to himself by that name.

“One? Like the number?”

Prime pulled himself out of his thoughts to look at the boy. 

“Actually I prefer Prime”, he said

“Oh, like ... like Optimus Prime?”

“Who?”

“He’s a robot warrior on a new tv show. You know they fight decepticons and transform into cars and stuff, " he rambled.

TV show? Robots? Prime had no idea what he was talking about and it must have showed because the boy trailed off on his explanation and said “ Well he’s pretty cool. Um my name’s Will by the way”

“Right, its ... nice to meet you Will”. Prime tried for a smile but it felt wrong. Probably didn’t look great either.  He was really out of practice when it came to talking to people.

“You don’t look like one of the patients from the lab ”, confessed Prime. Looking at the boys clothes which were not the standard hospital gown.

Will looked confused by his question, “ Lab? No I ....” Will drifted off in thought.

“The doctors at the lab” Prime insisted “they are the ones that sent you here right?” Now he was unsure. How else would Will have gotten here?

Will seemed to ponder this for a moment. Organizing his thoughts from the chaos it had been in. 

“I was biking home from my friends house and I ...I saw something in the road and crashed my bike. I got scared and ran home, but it ... it followed me”. 

Will had started crying again at the memory “...and I tried to get away, but it got into the house and I ran again but I couldn’t escape and then .. I .. I ...” he couldn’t finish. But he didn’t have to. Prime wasn’t sure how, but it seemed that poor Will had come across one of the vicious two-legged monsters from the void and had ended up being dragged here for whatever reason, probably for food. 

The real mystery though was how the monster had gotten to Will in the first place. As far as Prime knew there were no doors back to his world. Maybe something had happened, something new. That would explain the changes happening in the void.

Will was sniffling into his sleeve trying to quiet his sobs in the forest. As terrible as it was for him to be here, Prime was in a way quite thankful. Because if Will had been able to cross from their world to this one, then perhaps the way back was still open. Perhaps they could both go home. 

“Will?” Prime asked , and the boy looked up at him with sad eyes “Do you remember where you were right before you came here?”

Will took a moment to think back. “I was.. in the shed behind my house.”

Prime nodded along. “That’s good then.” They could retrace his steps and hopefully find a door.

“Good? How can that be good? None of this is good! ... I ... I just want to go home please ... please ... please ... please just take me home”

The tears began anew and Will’s panic was a physical pain to Prime, he pitied the boy. Will reminded him of himself when he’d first been thrown into the Void, he'd been terrified and desperate to go home, but he'd also been alone. He felt a fierce sense of protectiveness over Will.

So Prime in a move that surprised himself, picked up the boy into his arms and held him as he cried. Will wrapped his arms around his neck and clung to him, sobbing as he held onto Prime.

By the time Wills tears had slowed and his hiccups had stopped he had fallen into a light slumber. Prime held the boy closer to his chest and rested his back against a nearby tree. Settling in to not disturb Will's sleep.

He couldn’t hear any creatures and the forest was silent around him. The eerie quiet was as safe as the void ever got so he took the time to come up with a plan for when Will awoke. One that would hopefully see both Will and himself safely out and far away from the nightmare of the Void.


End file.
